I will be focusing on The Secret a bit longer, not sure if
it’s because of danger or the possibilities it presents. I have lived a life
that in some ways has become a manifestation of exactly what we wanted, for the
most part. To think it was all me is very short sighted, and that is the danger
of The Secret.
Today I want to focus on time and how both teach us to
manage it. With God Mark 1:35 tells us how we need to start our day:
And in the morning, rising up a
great while before day, he went out, and departed into a solitary place, and
there prayed.
I read this and immediately think of the “prayer closet”
since that has become the solitary place in most homes. Much of my praying has
become slowed since although we have a large home, it’s a very open plan with
no real solitary place. So often times I need to go into the mountains to
commune with God in nature. This is a component of every healthy relationship
with God, spending time with Him.
I use to read a section and dive into what that meant to me
at the time, but recently I have been using Google to find scripture support on
what I am thinking about these days. I talk about this because God and The
Secret have been known to operate on their own time. Both require time with
God, although one calls God “the universe” and more getting in touch with one’s
feelings.
I think the key that I have learned is to give everything
time. In The Secret one of the interviewees’ talks about his “dream board”
where he puts his dreams on the board and focuses on them each morning. When moving
his son asked about the box they were in and as he is showing him and
explaining he sees the home he dreamed about 5 years earlier is the home he
moved into, not like the home but the exact one.
So the key here is time as with God, often we need to wait
before our prayers our answered as difficult as that may seem in the “now”. We
live in a time where if we want something it usually arrives fast, we can go on
line and get it next day for 0 percent for 6 months. We can get a fair dinner
on the way home, almost instantly. We can get information on anything, almost
anywhere on our phones. The world and life are on a different time than when
Jesus walked the earth.
Think about this really, from the woods in southern Oregon I
can travel to Israel and walk where Jesus walked in less than day (24 hours).
So the speed of life is expected to keep pace. Guess what God has His time as
The Secret has its own. The problem with both today is we expect a McDonald’s
result from God or the universe and that is not the way things work. Sometimes
things do, while other times they do not. Many times your prayers are answered
quickly and many times it takes time, like years or decades.
The key is both require focus on God and never to give up.
We find often our prayers or desires change over time and become focuses on something
more in line with what we really want and need. Praying for an elephant as a
child is not realistic since based on the amount of poo a horse produces I can’t
imagine maintaining an elephant. So don’t think God is ignoring you or The
Secret doesn’t work, often we give up on God before things really start to
happen. A big lesson we can learn from The Secret is giving God time, so we can
understand why. Often we need training before we can set the world on fire
(figuratively of course) and that takes time.